Shirley Dereniwski (left) and her cousin Unis Hunt meet for the first time in Brantford, Ontario on Wednesday, September 12, 2012. They connected as a result of Shirley's daughter Kim Pitt researching their family's ancestry on line. They are sharing pictures with each other and catching up on other family members. Unis who lives in England is here for three weeks meeting and visiting relatives. WENDY OLIVER/BRANTFORD EXPOSITOR


On the left is Shirley hold her younger sister Martha Myyssonen, and Unis on the right. The family resemblance is very strong between the two women in these photos. WENDY OLIVER/BRANTFORD EXPOSITOR

Laughter and a lifetime of memories are filling the air at a Brantford home where two cousins have reunited after a separation of 70 years.

Shirley Dereniwski, 77, and Unis Hunt, 81, were children the last time they met on the

occasion of the funeral of Shirley's father in England in 1942.

“I just wanted to hug her. A few tears came to my eyes,” Shirley said, describing the moment Tuesday afternoon when she first laid eyes on her cousin.

“Seventy years is a long time,” she said.

One day into Unis's three-week visit, the cousins are sharing old memories and forging new ones as they get caught up on decades of family ties.

“We had a good old chatter,” Unis said on Wednesday.

Unis, from Weybridge, Surrey, England, has also met Shirley's sister Janice Nyyssonen, of Brantford.

The reunion was made possible thanks to Shirley's daughter, Kim Pitt, who spent several years tracing her family tree and trying to track down her mother's living relatives across the Atlantic.

Royal Navy Able Seaman Stanley Gillam was injured on a ship during the Second World War and returned to a hospital in Brighton, England where he died on March 24, 1942.

He left behind his young widow Gertrude and their daughter Shirley. Gertrude then married Albert Main in 1944. The couple had two daughters and, soon after the war's end, they all moved to Canada.

Shirley knew little about her mother's side of the family. She remembered only the first names of the cousins she knew as a child and recalled an uncle named Ernest. Her mother, Gertrude, had not kept in touch with her brother or his family.

“There was little to build on,” Kim said.

Undaunted, Kim began building a family tree and posted what information she knew on the Internet genealogy site MyHeritage.

About three years passed before the site matched her with her mother's cousin Eddie Elliott, who was living in Spain. Kim emailed Eddie and learned that Kim's grandmother Gertrude was indeed Eddie's aunt.

On the left is Shirley hold her younger sister Martha Myyssonen, and Unis on the right. The family resemblance is very strong between the two women in these photos. WENDY OLIVER/BRANTFORD EXPOSITOR

“I had tears in my eyes right away,” Kim said.

What followed was another teary reunion over the Internet as cousins Shirley and Eddie saw and spoke to each over over Skype.

“My mom had tears streaming down her face and goosebumps on her arms. She was so happy,” Kim said.

It was through Eddie that that the Canadian branch of the family was reunited with his sister Unis. Shirley and Unis have enjoyed frequent phone chats leading up to Unis's trip to Canada.

Finding her mother's cousins has been a thrill for everyone involved, Kim said.

“It has affected my mom in a big way,” she said, noting that her mother grew up without any real knowledge of cousins, aunts or uncles.

“She finally has a sense of belonging, knowing where she came from and who she is,” Kim said.

“I'm so grateful to Kim” for tracking down the family," Shirley said. “It's filling in gaps in my life.”

By Heather Ibbotson, Brantford Expositor

Source: brantfordexpositor.ca